and in all ages a binding with a number of lines between coloured spaces was common
Fig. 196.
and on borders of architecture and statuary thrones
CHAPTER V
SYMBOLICAL DECORATION
The Egyptian who expressed all his thoughts by a symbolical writing, full of determinatives, was naturally much given to symbolism in his decoration. Not, however, that all his decoration was symbolic in a recondite sense; the ever-present lotus ornament was merely a thing of beauty; the lotus was not a sacred plant, it is not associated with any divinity in particular, and only in one unusual instance does it ever occur in the hieroglyphs. The fanciful habit of Europe, in seeing a hidden sense in every flower, was not akin to the simple and elementary mind of the Egyptian. But certain striking emblems he used continually; and one of the earliest of these is the uraeus snake, or cobra in his wrath, reared up with expanded body ready to strike. The dignity and power of the animal made it to be an emblem of the king, or rather perhaps of the royal power of death. That capital punishment was used in Egypt is seen in the Westcar Tales, which probably date from the Old Kingdom, where a condemned malefactor is ordered to be brought forth for a magician to try his power in bringing him to life when slain. The king, as having the power of death, bore the uraeus always on his head-dress; and from the earliest days (at Medum) the royal court of justice was adorned with a cornice of uraei, implying that there resided the royal right of judgment and of condemnation. This cornice seems, however, to have been regarded as merely royal in later times, and was freely used to adorn any royal structure, even a wooden summer-house (Amenhotep II.); or the uraei formed a band around columns (Akhenaten), or appear as supporters of the royal cartouche (P. [72]), either plain (Ramessu II.) or winged (Horemheb L.D. III. 122).
Fig. 197.
198.—P. [72].